Robert T. Kelliher Jr., who lives on Springfield Street in Wilbraham, is the kind of guy who’s still called “Bobby” by those who know and love him even though he is in his mid-60s.

He’s also the kind of guy who refers to a slew of people as “my friend” or “my dear friend.” I’ve never heard anyone say that they don’t like Bobby.

We’ve known some of the same people in the course of our lives and, while they run the gamut from hot to warm to neutral to cool in their regard for me, they have, to a man or woman, a fondness for Bobby.

When I think about it, it isn’t difficult to understand why people love Bobby so. He brings to his initial encounter with a person and to each subsequent meeting, two essential ingredients for being well loved: A minimum amount of ego and a non-judgmental, non-critical attitude toward the other person.

Bobby grew up in Springfield. I’ve known him since high school (indeed, I went with him to our 40th class reunion a few years ago), and, by coincidence, he is now my next-door neighbor. When I heard that he was moving in, I told my other neighbor and dear friend Ed Kivari (himself a people person with a lot of friends who feel good about him) that “Bobby is one of the six or seven great men, depending on whether Davey Ortiz has hit a homer that day.”

Richard J. McCarthy, of Wilbraham, grew up in Springfield.

I actually didn’t hang around that much with Bobby in high school, although he was part of my “larger crowd.” It was a high school with nearly 3,000 students at the time, so it was possible to know and like someone, hang around with some of the same people and wind up at some of the same places.

There was a period after high school (our late teens and early 20s) when we did hang around together, brought together by our mutual “dear friend” Marty Hubert. Marty died a few years ago while living as an inveterate fisherman on the shores of Lake Champlain, and is, as a poet once dedicated his epic poem, the “secret hero” of what some of those who knew him write with their lines and lives.

One snapshot in my memory from that era occurred when Bobby had a job in the office of a plumbing supply company (if I remember the nature of the business correctly) as an “accounts receivable clerk.” It was a job for which he wore a shirt and tie. We’d pick him up at work, replete with his business attire, and go about the business that guys who are in their late teens and early 20s go about.

I can remember Bobby, Marty and I visiting a friend of ours at Holy Cross College in Worcester and all of us sleeping in his dorm room that night. Bobby slept on the floor, but there he was, answering an alarm clock at 6 a.m., splashing water on his face, putting on the same tie that he’d worn the day before, preparing to be at work on time to receive whatever accounts needed receiving that day.

Bobby also loves to tell the story about the time when he and I were hitchhiking back to Springfield from a night staying at a dive hotel near the Bowery of New York City (we romanticized “down and outers” in those days). We got picked up by the road manager for the rock group the Doors and got free admission to their concert in New Haven that night in return for our helping the band set up.

I remember that Bobby was wearing a trench coat, dress pants and brown wing-tip shoes at the time, looking every bit the accounts receivable clerk who had left work on Friday. Some people who saw him setting up for the Doors must have concluded that he was connected to the band and must be so “heavy” that he didn’t even need to dress “hip.” Meanwhile, Bobby is singing his own version of “Light My Fire” while he’s setting up.

The Vietnam War was part of my generation’s adolescence and early adulthood, and one day Bobby went off to war. He saw a lot of close combat and was awarded some quite well-thought-of medals.

When he came back, he somehow managed to pour everything that he’d experienced over there into the larger vessel of his exuberant, gregarious, upbeat personality.

Like a lot of combat veterans, Bobby talks very little about his experiences to those who weren’t over there with him. That doesn’t mean that in a life of connections, he doesn’t feel a special connection with other Vietnam vets, including guys I know like Tom Moriarty, Tim Rabbitt and Kevin English.

After the war, Bobby worked a number of jobs, some in the private sector and some in the public sector. He was greatly loved in all of them. During his time working for the Sheriff’s Department, inmates in the pre-release center dubbed him “The Mayor.”

This year he’s been able to enter semi-retirement. He’s got a part-time job delivering meals for the Meals On Wheels program for senior citizens. When I remarked to his wife, Margaret (Fiorentino), that he must be a great ray of sunshine in the lives of the elderly and shut-ins to whom he brings food, she responded, “Yeah, but I pity the last person on his delivery list who’s got to wait for his meal until Bobby gets done kibitzing with everybody else.”

Bobby loves being the “pater familis” of his children and grandchildren, and he and Margaret could probably list “family” as their chief retirement hobby. While we’re on the subject of Margaret, let me just say that Bobby did very well for himself at the altar.

I should also mention that besides being a great humorist who can serve as emcee for retirement parties and the like, Bobby has an excellent singing voice. He’s not reluctant to bestow his voice on others and can be heard weekly singing at Masses of Holy Name Church in Springfield, his boyhood parish.

He also became an actor in community theater later in life with the Wilbraham United Players. He’s been heard to say of his fellow thespians, “They’re wonderful people. I should have hung around with them in high school.”

In recent years, Bobby has been plagued with some illnesses, at least one of which is directly attributable to his service in Vietnam. When I saw him one day this fall, he told me that he walks for his health every day on the Wilbraham & Monson Academy outdoor track near our homes. Wilbraham & Monson is a good neighbor in allowing the community to utilize its track when not in use by its students.

A couple of days later, I came out to my driveway, from which you can see the track, and there was Bobby, walking with his iPod in his ear.

I slipped over, sight unseen, while he was on the far side of the track and waited for him to round toward me. When he approached, I started to applaud, and he stopped and chatted (as he is wont to do) until I shooed him on his way to continue his workout.

Applauding for Bobby as he walked toward me as if he was an Olympian finishing a run was consistent with the jocular way that Bobby and I have related to each other over the years, the kind of kidding that guys who have been young together will do.

I was aware, however, as I suspect that Bobby was also aware, that there was an element of seriousness to my applause. We’ve reached the age where our mortality is closing in on us. Our generation is starting to be planted in the ground.

The world is a better place with Bobby above ground. I’ll always put my hands together for anything that helps him stay here with the ones he loves, and the ones who love him.